


Headline: "Taxidermist Goes Nuts, Stabs Husband with Squirrel"

by hersilentlanguage



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Avengers Family, Crack Treated Seriously, Daily Bugle, Domestic Avengers, Gen, Humor, Light Swearing, Peter Has Some Regrets, Taxidermy, a moment of silence for Peter's dignity, based on a real headline, bizarre crimes, dead animal mention (non-graphic)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-20 16:54:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21060002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hersilentlanguage/pseuds/hersilentlanguage
Summary: Sure, you've seen the headlines. But do you have the full story?“Mr. Stark,” Peter called in a raspy whisper. He collapsed beneath the table with a phantom-like moan, rolling onto his back with one arm outstretched toward Tony.“Help…”“Yeah, yeah, I got ya.” Tony sighed fondly, then turned his head toward Clint. “Alright, Legolas, hand it over.” He extended a hand, palm up in expectation. “C’mon, you’ve had your fun.”Clint shook his head, wheezing with laughter as he clutched the phone to his chest. “Ma—mazing,”he babbled out. “S’larious!”“Swear to god,” Tony muttered, setting his coffee mug down. “When did I open a daycare, huh? Gimme that.” He worked Clint’s fingers apart, loosening his grip until the phone clattered onto the table.Tony snatched it up and reclaimed his coffee, taking a long sip as he inspected the image that filled the screen. When his brain caught up with what he was looking at, he almost spit his drink, trying not to choke on a laugh. “Oh, Pete…”





	Headline: "Taxidermist Goes Nuts, Stabs Husband with Squirrel"

**Author's Note:**

> I was looking at some ridiculous newspaper headlines recently when it occurred to me that there was some excellent prompt material at my fingertips. Sooo, this happened.

“—and that’s when the police found her webbed up with one of the squirrels still in her hand, so…” Peter shrugged, grabbing a fistful of Cheetos as he spoke. “Case closed! I think they got divorced, but I dunno. Pretty wild, huh?”

“You’re not serious,” said Clint, leaning across the table to stare intently at Peter. He studied the boy’s Cheeto-stuffed smile for a moment before sitting back and shaking his head decisively. “Yeah, it didn’t happen, kid. I’m calling bullshit.”

“Now, hang on, we can make this interesting.” Sam was rifling through his pockets, a spark of mischief in his eyes. “You see, Mr. Barton…” He slapped a twenty down on the table, grinning fiercely at Clint. “My friend and I here bet it _did _happen.”

Clint huffed, feeling around his empty pockets. “Yeah, well, uh—” His head snapped suddenly toward Wanda, who’d been quietly texting since Peter had finished his story. With a smug look, Clint wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into a tight side-hug. “I’ll bet you double _my_ friend can settle this.”

“No,” said Wanda, still texting. “Sorry, Uncle Barton.” She reached up to pat Clint’s cheek with one hand, sensing his pout without having to look at him.

Laughing, Sam snatched his twenty back. “You’re right, it’s settled—you owe me forty when you ain’t flat ass _broke.”_

“Man, that’s not how it works.”

“Let’s agree to disagree.”

“I _disagree_ to agree to that.”

“That is the dumbest sh—”

Wanda cleared her throat, drawing their attention. “No sense fighting about it.” Smiling a little too brightly, she looked up from her phone, straight at Peter. “Can’t you settle this with proof?”

Peter had been watching the exchange with a vaguely bemused expression. He was elbow-deep in a family-sized bag of Cheetos and still working on his last mouthful.

“Well, there’s the Bugle,” he said, chewing thoughtfully. “They probably interviewed the guy or something.”

Clint looked skeptical. “It’s the _Bugle.”_

“Yeah, forget the guy,” Sam chuckled out. “They’d have asked the goddamn _squirrel_ for an interview.”

“That’s true,” said Peter, also chuckling. “Better that than—”

_“Bozhe moy!”  
_

Wanda burst into a fit of giggles. _“Bozhe moy, bozhe moy,” _she repeated breathlessly in Russian. Her phone began to slip from her quaking hands as she laughed. The angled screen seized Peter’s attention, eliciting a deer-in-headlights expression as he took in what she’d dug up from <strike>the dark web</strike> (or rather, an obscure social media page).

“Is that—oh my_ god,_ it’s totally—”

“Yo, give it here! I gotta see that again!”

Clint and Sam were halfway out of their seats, scrabbling for control of the phone in a tangle of flailing limbs. Wanda, convulsing with laughter, made no attempt to intervene. She promptly toppled sideways into the empty chair at her left, uttering a half-coherent apology that sounded about as sincere as she looked saying it.

Peter whimpered in mortification, dragging out the sound so long that it ached in his throat. He began a boneless descent from his seat to the underside of the table just as Tony entered the room with a steaming cup of coffee.

“I leave for five minutes,” he murmured to himself, his lazy stride never faltering as he took in the hysterics. When his eyes fell on Peter, he smirked. “Kid, you look like you’re melting.”

“Mr. Stark,” Peter called in a raspy whisper. He collapsed beneath the table with a phantom-like moan, rolling onto his back with one arm outstretched toward Tony. _“Help…”_

“Yeah, yeah, I got ya.” Tony sighed fondly, then turned his head toward Clint. “Alright, Legolas, hand it over.” He extended a hand, palm up in expectation. “C’mon, you’ve had your fun.”

Clint shook his head, wheezing with laughter as he clutched the phone to his chest. “Ma—_mazing,”_ he babbled out. “S’larious!”

“Swear to god,” Tony muttered, setting his coffee mug down. “When did I open a daycare, huh? Gimme that.” He worked Clint’s fingers apart, loosening his grip until the phone clattered onto the table.  
  
Tony snatched it up and reclaimed his coffee, taking a long sip as he inspected the image that filled the screen. When his brain caught up with what he was looking at, he almost spit his drink, trying not to choke on a laugh.

Someone had pulled their phone camera out in time to snap a candid photo of a wide-eyed Spider-man coming off a fire escape. He had one hand out, trying to shoot a web at the opposite wall; with the other, he was straining to reach back between his shoulders to where a stiffly-posed grey squirrel was firmly latched on. Its tail had been caught swinging in a blur of motion from how Peter had been awkwardly hopping down the steps. The blur afforded it a sense of liveliness.

In the background of the frame, two lit windows revealed onlookers inside the building. In the one above Peter, a bald man was holding an ice pack to his neck while gazing down at Spider-man with the reverence afforded to a saviour. On the floor below, to Peter’s left, an old woman was aiming a water gun through the glass of her apartment, her eyes hot with malice.

The photo caption explained that the scene had been captured late on Halloween a year earlier, despite being uploaded only a few months ago. This had apparently brought the validity of the snap into question, because the uploader went on to vent about how it wasn’t staged and they had just forgotten about the file because they were drunk that night.

Tony was laughing so hard, he had to take a seat. “W-Wanda,” he said, trying to catch his breath, “you—you send me… send this.” He pushed the phone across the table toward her, and she nodded enthusiastically as she wiped a tear from her flushed cheeks. “I’m—I _gotta _frame this.”

A hand shot out from underneath the table, gripping at Tony’s ankle in desperation. _“No…”_

* * *

“I can’t believe he actually framed it.”

Peter stood with his nose pressed to the bulletproof glass of the Spider-man display. His eyes were wide and hollow as he turned to look at Rhodey, who met his affected stare with a sober expression.

There was a beat of silence.

Rhodey cleared his throat, realizing that Peter needed more than that. “Well, it serves a purpose. Makes Spider-man more… relatable.” He gestured sweepingly to the many service awards and other marked achievements that surrounded the notorious onesie at centre.

“That’s right, Pete,” said Tony, coming up behind them. “You should listen to your Uncle Platypus.” He flashed a feral grin at Rhodey, who smirked in response. “Anyway, kid, that’s not what I called you down here to see.”

“Really?” asked Peter, his eyebrow slowly raising in suspicion.

“Of course not!” Tony ruffled Peter’s curls with a little more vigour than usual, causing the boy to glower at him with still greater suspicion. “Didn’t you see the new award up there?”

“Nope, no way,” said Peter, crossing his arms and turning away. “Nice try, but I’m _not _falling for that one again.”

Rhodey hummed in thought, drawing Peter’s attention. “Oh, this one,” he murmured, seemingly to himself. “This one’s new.” He pretended not to notice when Peter arrived at his shoulder, trying to follow his gaze.

Tony hung back, squashing a fist into his mouth to hide a grin.

“Let’s see…” said Rhodey, squinting through the display glass. He began to read aloud in a quiet, serious voice, “This… Zombie Apocalypse Award is hereby presented—”

“To Spider-man,” Peter interjected in disbelief, “voted most likely to get_ bitten _and not tell anyone?” He whirled around to face Tony, who was desperately trying to compose himself. “This is _slander.”_

Rhodey snorted. “You got bit, kid. It’s okay.”

“It is so _not _okay, Uncle Rhodey!”

“You’re right,” said Tony. “The squirrel was in the wrong.” He spun lazily on his heel, tugging at Rhodey’s hand for the man to follow him while calling back to Peter, “We’ll discuss it more over lunch.”

Peter jogged to catch up, waving his hands animatedly as he proclaimed, “The squirrel was dead, Mr. Stark! It was _dead!”  
_

“Yes, I think your award recognizes that,” said Tony.

Rhodey nodded in agreement.

* * *

Half an hour later, Peter was sitting across from Tony and Rhodey in a diner booth. “At least I know the truth,” he grumbled, peering across the top of his triple-stacked burger with a lukewarm glare. “I was _attacked.”_

Tony looked up from the onion rings he was sharing with Rhodey. “No one’s arguing that,” he said with a smile. “The squirrel was _clearly _aggressive. I’d venture to say highly trained. Special ops, maybe? I’ve heard weirder.”

“Definitely weirder,” said Rhodey, wiping a few crumbs off his shirt. “Whole ass _raccoon _kinda weird up there.” He jerked a thumb at the ceiling, and Tony tried not to laugh when the eavesdropping child in the adjoining booth stared up with eyes wide as saucers.

Peter stared at them, dead-eyed. “She was a taxidermist,” he said flatly. “I was stabbed with teeth. _Teeth, _you guys.”

“Yeah, I think there’s a word for that,” said Tony, tapping his chin in consideration. “Say, what’s that word again, honeybear? What do we call it when someone gets ‘stabbed’—” He made air quotes around the word. “—with teeth?”

Rhodey steepled his hands together, looking contemplative. “If we’re being technical,” he began, locking eyes with Peter, “ya got bit.”

There was a loud thunk as Peter dropped his forehead against the diner table, groaning in frustration. “You’re both the _worst.”_

Tony smiled and flicked a piece of onion ring into Peter’s curls.

“That’s just the rabies talking.”

**Author's Note:**

> (Translation note: According to Google, _“bozhe moy”_ translates roughly to "oh my god" in Russian.)
> 
> Thanks for reading! Kudos and comments are always greatly appreciated. <3


End file.
